


rumor has it

by chii



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Blade of Marmora Keith, Fluff and Humor, Galra Keith (Voltron), Gen, Humor, Lance and the very bad no good day, M/M, Mutual Pining, Pining, garrison era
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-21
Updated: 2017-09-21
Packaged: 2019-01-01 04:21:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,034
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12148515
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chii/pseuds/chii
Summary: There's a rumor at the Garrison that Lance snuck a large, probably attractive dude into his dorm-room overnight despite the rules. Normally, Lance would roll with this sort of rumor and laugh about it.The problem is thereisa large, attractive dude in his bed, except he's been knocked out from the drugs the Garrison gave him and it'sTakashi Shirogane, supposedly dead butnot, plus one metal arm.It's been a long day.[S1 AU]





	rumor has it

**Author's Note:**

> I've desperately wanted to write some shance but haven't finished much because I've been lazy, and then this idea struck me. Specifically, the idea of Keith not being there to rescue Shiro and what the Garrison trio would have done instead. It's marked at 1/1 chapters since it's standalone but I'll probably add bits and pieces and other scenes to it as the mood strikes me.

They’re going to get kicked out of the Garrison if they’re caught. No one’s said it yet, but Lance is certain that they’re all thinking i-

“We’re gonna get kicked out,” Hunk whispers under his breath. There it is. Which, yeah, sure, this is a valid concern and all especially with tampering with the Garrison’s (unoccupied) vehicles, but Lance doesn’t have any sort of comfort to offer right now past _don’t get caught_ , so he stays quiet and pats Hunk on the back. A moment later, he shifts his weight from foot to foot, glancing down at Gunderson. “Dude, we’re so gonna get caught and expelled and my family is gonna _kill me_.” 

“Is that better or worse than the Garrison thinking we’re attacking them and them killing us?” Gunderson asks, glasses flashing as he looks up and-- wow. _Wow_ , Gunderson is a little dark, that’s a thing. Also: not helping. 

“No one is getting killed, okay, we just need to create a diversion so we can get in there and get him _out_ ,” Lance hisses, watching Hunk glance from Gunderson’s screen to the wires and internal workings of the car he’s setting up to explode, but only a little bit. Sure, it was massively illegal and sure they’ll get kicked out if they get caught, but _Lieutenant Takashi (“call me Shiro”) Shirogane_ is in there and Lance cannot, in good conscience, just let him _stay there_. Not with the way he’d reacted at waking up and not with the way the Garrison just...ignored the Kerberos mission, waving it off as a failure. Something stank and all of them were aware of it. Besides, okay, maybe there’s a little bit of something in Lance that’s a bit thrilled at being able to _rescue his hero_. That’s reasonable. That’s cool. He can totally be cool about this.

“Are you done yet?” Gunderson whispers again, and Lance peeks over to see if Hunk is, like he has any sort of concept of what the hell he’s doing in there past tweaking wires and _literally rigging it to explode_. There’s something about rerouting the energy and hooking it into the laptop and -- yeah, outside of suggesting _we need to create a diversion, do you think you can make the Jeeps explode_ , Lance is leaving it up to them. “Hunk, you’re done. It’s good. Come on, we need to get back up to the point so we can detonate it.” 

The noise Hunk makes is a cross between a distressed _hnn_ and a _nooo_ , but he closes the hood of the vehicle very, very quietly and then wipes his hands on his pants like he can wipe away the fact that they’re about to commit about 85,000 dollars worth of damage to break into a secret facility. Lance’d wipe his hands too, he supposes, but he didn’t set it to blow so instead he pats Hunk on the back again and gets a similarly distressed noise in response.

As it turns out, they have nothing to worry about because the plan works perfect as far as getting them in the door and the smoke _has_ filled up the room but still: the real problem is once they’re inside. Hunk seems to realize it at the same moment because he stares wide-eyed at Lance just as one of the doctors lunges for them, fog twisting in the rush of displaced air. Lance yelps and side-steps the one going after him, shoving him into a table of equipment with a horrific clatter. It sends a scalpel clattering to the ground, neatly hitting his boot as it skitters across the ground. Lance grabs it just as Hunk hits one guy over the head with the fire hydrant and Pidge trips the other one, tying him up with a line of what looked like cables from the wire inside. His head stays pushed against the ground, helmet backwards so he can’t see any of them, and the other guy is knocked out which means they’re about as safe as safe can be. 

Still, when it’s over, there’s a moment where all of them are frozen and Lance’s hands are trembling just a little bit because adding assault onto a charge of blowing up a few cars is… yeah, he’s just not going to think about that. There are more important things to consider, like the fact that they’ve gotten in and they need to get out with a guy that’s unconscious, and then figure out where they’re _storing_ said unconscious guy. 

Shiro’s still on the table so the first step is getting him off and Lance isn’t sure how long it’s going to take to saw through the loops holding his wrists and ankle down. He starts hacking at one because waiting isn’t going to help. “If one of you has something better than a scalpel, that would be extra useful right now,” he calls over his shoulder. Gunderson circles around to the other side almost grimly, jaw set as he uses a much larger knife to hack at the opposite cuffs. 

Behind them, Hunk makes an uneasy noise. “I do not want to think about what kind of surgery you do where you need a knife that big.” 

Before anything else gets said, though, both of Shiro’s wrists are free and Gunderson hacks through the feet cuffs too leaving them free to try and gently haul him off the table. It’s great, up until Lance realizes that hauling (what is he, like a hundred and sixty?) a ton of dead weight off the table is easier said than done. Shiro starts to sort of ooze off the side of the table like a human slinky and Lance _yelps_ , dragging him up by his human arm just as Hunk scurries over to catch him. Hunk takes one side while Lance takes the other, grimacing. He’s _heavy_ and that arm feels like it weighs a million pounds; how did he _walk_ with it. Hunk’s carrying that side like it’s nothing, though which means Lance can just sort of guide and support. This, Lance thinks, is why they’re such good bros; Hunk’s obscenely strong and Lance is -- well, at this point he’s good at plotting break-ins to secret governmental facilities so that’s cool. 

“Uhhh, so not to sound like we’re in a rush, but we’re really in a rush and need to go,” Hunk says urgently, just as Gunderson balances the laptop in their arm and types something. The door to the back clicks open and he nods to it, already running for the exit. Exchanging a look, Hunk and Lance follow, Shiro silent and still between them, his feet dragging with each of their steps. Around the opposite side of the pop-up tent they were holding Shiro in is a Garrison issued car; they load Shiro into the passenger side as quickly as they can and Lance fastens the seatbelt before whirling, staring Gunderson down. Hunk’s already clambering into the back seat, because there’s no way in hell he’s driving and Lance levels a hand, staring him down. 

“Okay, Gunderson. Rock, paper, scissors, shoot on three,” he says and waits for him to reply, antsy. For a moment, he thinks that Gunderson is going to object and want to drive anyway, but no, he rolls his eyes and pushes his glasses up his nose. One, two, three, and Lance shoots paper while Gunderson shoots rock. Victory firmly in hand, Lance grins and slaps his hand on top of Gunderson’s and then climbs into the Jeep, fumbling for the keys. 

“It’s Pidge, not Gunderson,” Gunderson says from the back, too short to be seen in the rear view mirror until Lance adjusts it. Another few taps on the keyboard and something _else_ explodes on the opposite side of the building. “Let’s _go_.” 

Pidge is about the weirdest name outside of Gunderson but Lance doesn’t question it for the time being because he’s _way_ more concerned with turning the vehicle on and peeling out of the parking lot. They take one of the old frontage roads back to the Garrison; it’s unoccupied and unpatrolled, but it also means that they have to hope that when they hit the main gates that it pops open with whatever keycard Gu-- Pidge cloned, because if not, they’re screwed. 

“It’ll work,” Pidge says tersely, fingers flying on the keyboard with a steady clack-clack. Beside him, Hunk’s clutching the seat Shiro’s slumped over in with a white-knuckled grip which is entirely unfair because Lance has been driving for _years_ , thank you, and never been in an accident. “You do realize we still don’t know where we’re going to _put him_ now that we’ve effectively stolen him. Unless one of you has any family near by that’s willing to store a guy who is supposed to be dead, but _isn’t and has a metal arm._ ” 

“That’s gonna be a no for both of us,” Hunk says mournfully. “So-” 

“Our room,” Lance takes the next turn and presses the gas a little harder, speeding underneath the stars. “We’ll take the purple thing off of him, get him to our room because it’s the closest and get some clothes, and then...figure it out.” 

It’s a plan with about sixty different holes in it but no one objects because they don’t have anything better, so that’s what they go with. The keycard swipe does work; they’re admitted in and Pidge clones the vehicle’s ID so it looks like it’s been returned from where it was taken from. From there, they can park it and he and Hunk lift Shiro, carrying him to the nearest entrance which is thankfully unmanned. Halfway down the hall, Pidge freezes at whatever they see on the CCTV they’re looking at, jerking their head up. “Go-- _go_ , I’ll distract them, just get to your room and I’ll see you guys in class.” 

They take off running before either he or Hunk can object, which means their job is to haul ass to their room. When the door locks behind them, he and Hunk both let out a sigh that’s as heavy as it is relieved. “Bed?” Hunk asks warily, and Lance nods, so they heft him up into Lance’s tiny bunk and straighten him out as best as they can. “I’ll let Gun-- Pidge know we got back okay.” 

While Hunk takes care of that, Lance drags the covers back from under Shiro’s limp form and gently starts removing his boots and the purple oversuit, only to pause at the faint rust colored stain on the side. When he peels down the front of Shiro’s suit, he realizes what that was -- blood. He’d bled through the black undersuit and into the purple one and his chest is-- 

“Ohhhh no, oh no, no,” Hunk says and steps back, already heading for the bathroom to grab bandages and get away from the sight of Shiro’s chest. 

Objectively, Lance thinks that it’s probably an okay chest -- Shiro’s got muscle on his muscle, what the _hell_ , but he’s also covered in a mess of scars and open wounds, scrapes and bruises on both his wrists and his chest. _What the hell happened to you_? 

“I got it, buddy,” Lance assures, taking the first aid kit blindly. He’s got years of patching up his little siblings under his belt; he can handle this. It doesn’t take terribly long, but there’s bruising from something hitting Shiro in the shoulder and in the gut; it’s yellowing with age, fading, but still vicious. The top of the body suit is basically ruined so he cuts it to the belt with the scissors in the kit and then tosses the incriminating evidence into the trash, frowning. For a moment, both he and Hunk just stare at him, disbelieving. 

“We just broke into a secret Garrison building to break him out and now the only evidence that we’ve...done that is asleep in our room, and we have class in an hour,” Hunk says, which, while a good summary of what happened, is not exactly making Lance feel any better. “I’m. I’m just gonna eat breakfast now and then sleep, and hope that when he wakes up he’s not freaking out like he was earlier, okay?” 

“Yeah, I got this,” Lance assures, with all the confidence in the world in his tone and absolutely none of that confidence actually in him. The door hisses closed when Hunk leaves for the mess hall, which means Lance is left with a steadily breathing Shiro in his bed. Gently, he grabs the covers and tugs them up to his shoulders, tugging him in so he doesn’t get cold and then strips out of his pajamas to get into his Garrison uniform. A quick shower rinses the cold sweat off of him and he’s halfway through putting lotion on his face when there’s a knock at the door. 

Stupidly, he forgets that he’s got Shiro right _there_ , assuming that it’s Hunk bringing back food from the mess hall. 

“Hey, did you bring back enough for all of us, ‘cause I bet he’s gonna be hungry when he waaa--- oh my god.” Lance stills, staring at someone who is _not Hunk_. Instead, it’s _O’Malley,_ another guy his year, about a foot taller and broader, which means he’s tall enough to look over Lance entirely and see that there’s someone in his bed. Lance sees the moment that the image clicks into place and O’Malley’s face _lights up._ “Dude, no! No, you don’t see anything, go, get out of here, there’s nothing in here and whatever you needed can totally wait!”

In the list of people that Lance absolutely doesn’t want to find out about a secret guy in his room, O’Malley is pretty far down at the bottom, beaten by teachers, faculty and tattletales but the fact that he’s grinning like a shithead doesn’t bode well, either. 

“Dude, _nice_ ,” O’Malley says, lifting his hand for a high-five with all the earnestness of a bro who assumes that Lance is doing the post-shower from-- oh. _Oh god_. Lance realizes abruptly what it looks like, him shirtless and post-shower, a clearly topless dude in his bedroom. “Lookit you, McClain, I didn’t think you were that ballsy.” 

As a matter of fact, Lance is _not_ that ballsy and he knows that he’s had to fight for literally everything he’s gotten at the Garrison so ruining this isn’t an option which means that unfortunately, playing along with O’Malley is the only option here. It wouldn’t be the first time someone’s snuck their significant other into the dorms and it’s not an offense that would get someone kicked out, so rolling with that is better than the reality. 

He closes the door to a sliver and squints at O’Malley, poking a finger at him through the gap in the door. “No high-fives, you didn’t see anything, okay? He’ll be gone by lunch.” That’s a pretty hefty promise to make with absolutely no plan, but it’s all he’s got. O’Malley doesn’t protest it, thankfully; he grins wider and shoots fingerguns at Lance and then ambles down the hall again, whatever he needed clearly not that important. 

This time, Lance locks the door and thuds his head against it, leaving a smear of lotion from his forehead that he has to scrub away after he’s tugged on a tshirt. Hunk comes back just as he’s finishing his morning routine and Shiro is still sleeping, but breathing, so he’ll take it. Loaded on the plate that Hunk’s brought back are three breakfast burritos and an assortment of fruits which is about as safe as you can get with mess hall food. Lance takes one and then packages the rest for the mini fridge while Hunk crawls into his bed, faceplanting into it. 

“I am going to sleep for the next forty minutes and then we are gonna go to class and figure out how to fix this,” Hunk mumbles, blindly pointing a finger in what’s just a little left of where Lance is standing, looking down at him, but close enough. 

“I’ll wake you up when it’s time to go,” Lance promises, because he is a Good Best Friend, and they’re in this together. A few moments later, he hears a tell-tale snore and figures that napping after that night isn’t the worst idea after the night they’ve had. Shiro’s still down for the count and hasn’t stirred, so he feels safe enough planting his desk chair in front of the door and pillowing his head on his arms, dozing off until it’s actually time to get up. He forgets entirely to mention the whole O’Malley problem, but that’s an issue for later Lance.

__________________________________

 

If someone told Lance a day ago that there would potentially be a rumor going around the Garrison that Lance had snuck a large, probably attractive man into his room at the Garrison (and he was asleep, shirtless, in Lance’s bed) he would have laughed them out of his room and into the next week. Rumors flit around the Garrison like a cold, mutating into something awful and outlandish each and every single time. 

Once, there’d been a rumor that the new kid was some kind of alien, because he didn’t know how the hell to interact with anyone else and didn’t seem interested in interacting with anyone else. Obviously it was bullshit, but Lance had tried to talk to the guy once and been blown off, which _sucked_ , because that guy was the only thing between him and being fighter class instead of cargo, _and_ he followed Shiro around like a little duckling. Part of Lance wondered what this kid had that he didn’t, but he hadn’t been able to focus on it; if he could be better, he could beat him. 

Point is, rumors grow. So what probably started as a rumor about Lance dating someone has grown to outlandish proportions - he’s got more than one person in his room, he’s done this before, and the guy is _older_ and ( _objectively, O’Malley had insisted during one of the retellings, objectively the dude was probably attractive_ ), isn’t that scandalous. Lance has only found this out because of a private message he received from Bhatia, who he’d dated for a few months last year and still remained friends with. 

**[ PRIVATE MESSAGE ] a.bhatia:** so you snuck someone into your room, huh?  
**[ PRIVATE MESSAGE ] l.mcclain** i have literally no idea what you’re talking about 

The fact that the reality of the situation is that he _does_ have a large, attractive man sleeping in nothing but what are probably alien space leggings (and nothing else) in his bed, and on top of that, that man is _Takashi Shirogane_ , who is A) his hero and B) supposed to be dead. It’s been a day.

Fact is, no one told him this would be happening and so Lance is pretty certain that it’s acceptable, if not _understandable_ that he is woefully unprepared for the very real knowledge that if he looks two feet to his right, _Takashi fucking Shirogane_ is comatose. In his bunk. Inside the Garrison. A quick glance over at him reveals: still sleeping, breathing soft and shallow, and still _extremely large_ , like his muscles have muscles have muscles. It’s obscene. Then again, he shouldn’t be ogling the guy they rescued from being held captive and is probably traumatized, so Lance exhales through his nose and firmly looks away. 

Hunk’s already left for class after a cat nap and that means Lance is alone for any sort of mental breakdown he wants to have, so that’s...just going to get put off until later. 

“Oh my god,” Lance mutters under his breath and pushes his hands against both of his closed eyes. He has to go to _class_ soon, he has things to take care of, but Shiro’s not awake and Pidge and Hunk have the same class so he’s _basically_ shit out of luck. 

**l.mcclain:** are you guys sure you can’t cover for me  
**p.gunderson:** is he still out? He should be waking up soon, right?  
**h.garrett:** what they dosed him with was enough to knock out a horse, or like, an elephant. If he doesn’t wake up until lunch i wouldn’t be surprised.  
**l.mcclain:** ok well he’s NOT AWAKE yet so this isn’t helping also there may be a small problem 

Instantly, both Pidge and Hunk’s **. . .** notifications light up and Lance rolls his eyes to the ceiling and groans again. 

**p.gunderson:** what do you mean by problem  
**h.garrett:** i specifically said i did not want to see the word problem at all when you suggested SNEAKING HIM BACK INTO THE GARRISON  
**h.garrett:** i told you  
**h.garrett:** dude i told you this was the worst idea  
**h.garrett:** what went wrong  
**h.garrett:** did the security cams catch us  
**h.garrett:** did the badge cloning break. Did the vehicle ID not mask properly  
**h.garrett:** i knew it  
**l.mcclain:** dude calm down  
**l.mcclain:** d) none of the above. I have physics with O’Malley and he stopped by my room and kind of maybe saw something? I smoothed it over, it’s fine, we’re FINE but you know  
**l.mcclain:** o’malley

O’Malley, with the biggest mouth this side of the Garrison, who, while being a decent enough guy, could not be trusted to keep a secret to save his life, which meant that Lance sneaking a secret man into his bedroom overnight was likely going to grow as a story and there was exactly nothing he could do about it because he has ten minutes before class. If Bhatia is messaging him about it, then it’s probably already going to be something he’s going to have to deal with the moment he steps into the hall.

 **p.gunderson:** pin a note to his shirt telling him not to freak out and don’t worry, no one will believe o’malley. Meet you in class

Lance stares at the notification for a moment and then narrows his eyes, because, wow, below the belt much?  
**l.mcclain:** i am not dignifying that with a response  
**p.gunderson:** you just did but ok  
**h.garrett:** [ . . . ]

 **[ PRIVATE MESSAGE ] h.garrett:** i’m sure some people will believe it’s true even if all of us  
**[ PRIVATE MESSAGE ] h.garrett:** some more than others  
**[ PRIVATE MESSAGE ] h.garrett:** wish that it weren’t.  
**[ PRIVATE MESSAGE ] h.garrett:** at least in this scenario and not one where you actually did have someone there, for stuff  
**[ PRIVATE MESSAGE ] l.mcclain:** thanks buddy ill see you in class

For a moment, the sheer ridiculousness of the situation hits him and he drags a hand over his face one more time before standing up to gather his notebooks. If Shiro wakes up in the middle of a room he doesn’t know after all that, what the hell is he going to do? Hopefully, read a note if it’s pinned to his chest but Lance doesn’t have the highest hopes for that working. Instead, he takes a fast food bag and tapes it around the handle with a sign that says “DO NOT LEAVE THIS ROOM PLEASE!!!” taped to it. 

The door gets one, as well. In front of the door, Lance stares a moment and then figures, screw it, and ties the laces of Shiro’s boots from the bedframe to the desk, meaning if he tries to walk through the door the laces will catch his attention and hopefully not trip and kill him. For good measure, he tapes a sign that says, “I WILL EXPLAIN EVERYTHING WHEN I’M BACK FROM CLASS PLEASE!!!!! DO NOT! LEAVE!!!!! THANK YOU” to the boots. 

Somehow, through all of that, Shiro doesn’t budge and so he leaves a slightly longer one taped to Shiro’s chest. (It’s very large and Lance is suddenly hyper aware of just how small his bunk _is_ , for the cost to be at the Garrison they ought to get bigger beds. He’s also hyper aware of the massive scar that bisects him and doesn’t want to think about what exactly that means happened.) This one is simpler, though still scribbled in a rush. 

“RESCUED U FROM GARRISON. AM STUDENT. BACK AFTER 1100. DO **NOT** LEAVE ROOM. WILL EXPLAIN EVERYTHING WHEN BACK. PLEASE DO NOT FREAK OUT OR LEAVE OR WE ARE BOTH CAUGHT. FOOD IS IN FRIDGE.” After a moment of staring at it, he takes it back and hurriedly scribbles on, “LANCE MCCLAIN - FIGHTER CLASS PILOT” because, well, it’s true, right? And besides, that sounds a lot more convincing and reassuring than “cargo pilot” which he’s definitely not anymore, so it stays.

The letter is taped to Shiro’s ridiculously broad chest and Lance gives the room one final sweep. There’s water, there’s the breakfast burritos in the fridge, all within reach and the bathroom is right there. Shiro shouldn’t need anything that would require him leaving and getting caught, so Lance figures he’s done about as much as he can and tugs the covers up a little further over Shiro, checks his temperature and then heads to class, locking the door behind him. He’d better text Hunk about the shoelaces blocking the door; if he went back to the room and tripped on them, he was gonna be pissed. 

The prayer he says on the way to class must do something, because outside of some snickers and eyebrow waggles, no one says anything to him all day. He and Hunk huddle close to each other during class and whisper back and forth, looping in Pidge when they’re all in the same class together. From there, they work out a plan for lunch. 

Absolutely none of Lance’s clothes are going to fit Shiro, which means he’ll have to go through Hunk’s to get a shirt for him to wear. His pants are a no go, but Pidge’s roommate is probably a close enough size. It’s not perfect but the shirt and a set of pants that Pidge filtches from his roommate’s closet and one of Lance’s hats means that for a moment, they’ve got an outfit they can hopefully dress him in once they get back to the room. “I’ll handle it,” Lance assures with all of the surety he doesn’t really feel but has to pretend to have. “I can get him dressed and if Pidge can get me back outside, I’ll talk to him and make sure he’s...somewhere else before end of today. Students sneak their boyfriends and girlfriends inside here all the time! It can’t be that hard, right?” 

“As someone who has never snuck anyone in here because it’s _against the rules_ , I don’t _really know_ ,” Hunk hisses from behind his hands, currently covering his face. 

“We’ll handle it,” Pidge says dryly before Lance can respond, gathering up his laptop and books. “You should get back and make sure that he hasn’t woken up and then when we’re ready to get him out of here, I’m coming with you. Whatever he was talking about -- Voltron, space, aliens, he was on the mission to Kerberos and I have questions I want answered.” 

“Okay, but we’re not gonna interrogate him the moment he wakes up, that seems a little rude.” A lot rude, but they also rescued him so Lance isn’t sure exactly how much it matters on the rudeness scale here, given everything going on. “We’ll take him out to the town and...I don’t know, I think I can get him a hotel room or something if we need to.” 

He’s not exactly rolling in it, but he does have money squirreled away for fun things like when they get leave or he’s too sick of mess food. Hotels in middle of nowhere Texas are relatively cheap and if it’s just for one night, he figures that he can eat the cost of that without it hurting _too much_. 

All of that decided, they split off. Hunk’s staying in the Engineering lab until dinner, which isn’t exactly surprising, because he’s made it abundantly clear that he wants nothing to do with this situation until they figure it out. Lance, on the other hand, hasn’t been called into the office and hasn’t gotten in trouble yet, so he’s assuming that either Shiro is still comatose, or he’s woken up and read the letters and thus, everything’s fine. Pidge veers off to his room to grab his roommate’s pants, and Lance takes the next right down his hall.

Halfway to his room, though, O’Malley passes and Lance feels his desire to keep living in this very moment wither away. Turning around does exactly no good because there’s a loud, “McClain!” and then an arm is thrown around his shoulder. Abruptly, he’s tugged in against O’Malley’s shoulder and he rolls his eyes to the sky, begging to be either struck down or to somehow escape without interrogation. As if to mock him, the arm around him squeezes.

It’s smaller than Shirogane’s arm, Lance thinks, just to be petty. O’Malley isn’t a bad sort, either; he’s good at what he does which is being built like a brick shithouse and breaking through walls and doors on missions that need it. He’s just...loud. Boisterous, one might say, if they were being charitable. Right now, Lance isn’t feeling particularly charitable, so he opts for, _blabbermouth_. “Please tell me you didn’t tell everyone you saw someone in my room, just. Tell me that’s what you’re going to say here.” 

From the way O’Malley laughs, bright and cheerful, Lance guesses that’s a no so he tries to steer them down the hall toward his room in hopes of ditching him faster. “Listen, I just wanted to say I don’t know how you managed it, but there would be some people very interested in how to bypass security, if, you know,” O’Malley lifts his hand and wiggles his fingers. Lance doesn’t know what that motion is supposed to insinuate so he stays quiet, doggedly heading for his room. 

Why O’Malley is still following along with Lance remains to be seen but one more turn and they’re at the 400 block which is where he’s based, so escape is relatively close. Saying nothing clearly isn’t going to work, though, so Lance hedges, “Can we seriously not play the ignore or pretend you didn’t see anything here game? Hear no evil, speak no evil? I scratch your back, you scratch mine, you know?” 

“Listen, you’re fine and Garrett is fine, too, I think brass’d be more impressed knowing you managed it.” Thankfully, O’Malley doesn’t point out the very fundamental flaw in Lance’s suggestion, which is that he’s hoping he’ll just agree to it without Lance actually doing any hypothetical back scratching. They’re so close to Lance’s door and he digs into his pocket for his keycard, swiping it just as O’Malley continues, “I’m just saying, dude, one is impressive but two is--” 

Lance doesn’t find out what that sentence ends with because his keycard cues the door to crack open and neatly, from years of siblings bigger than him, he twists out of grasp and ducks into his room, waving and talking over his shoulder just as he closes the door. “Okay, great talk, really gotta go, bye buddy!” 

He makes it as far as locking the door behind him when he’s suddenly bodyslammed against it hard enough his teeth clack together. One moment, he’s trying to recover and the next, an arm is twisted behind his back until he yelps, flailing, slapping the wall. Cool, Shiro’s awake and apparently murderous, which is really not one of the projected outcomes Lance saw coming but the way his day’s been going, he really should have.

“Oh my god please don’t kill me, Lieutenant Shirogane, it’s me--” Which isn’t helpful in convincing Lance that he’s saying the right thing so it’s probably not inspiring Shiro to freak out any less. Something sharp presses against his throat and Lance’s stomach drops to his feet. He doesn’t remember any knives being in the room but that apparently was not the case. “Wh-- a _knife!_ Why the hell do you- where did you even _get--_? Please don’t freak out and cut my head off, please, okay, we’re trying to get you out of here.” 

“ _Keith_!” says a very Shiro sounding someone said from what was probably the bed. Lance stares at the door his cheek is mashed up against and tries to reconcile this new knowledge.

 _One is impressive but two is--_ he hears in his head again, and swallows hard. Oh, no. 

“What,” Lance says in what thinks is an exceptionally calm voice. “Can someone please explain why there’s a guy named Keith in my room, and why Keith has a knife pointed at my neck?” 

He’d also like to know who the hell Keith is, but not having a guy named Keith pointing a knife to his neck was arguably way more important to focus on right now. Priorities.

“Keith, come on. The door’s locked.” Shiro’s voice again, calmer, lower, and way more familiar which was _really_ weirding him out since that guy wasn’t moving. “I think he’s one of the ones who got me out of there, cut it out.” 

High in his throat, Lance whines, because _cut it out_ is like, exactly the opposite of what kind of words he wants to hear when a knife is pressed against extremely delicate skin.

Abruptly, the pressure releases and Lance scrambles the short few feet he has between doorway and closet and throws his fists up. He has to clench and unclench is right hand to get feeling back into it after this Keith jerkwad held it so hard, but that quickly stops mattering the moment he actually looks at the guy. He’s dressed in what looks like an all black and purple body suit with glowing lines on it. It’s sleek, but _really_ not Garrison issue. A moment later, he takes in the sight of a shock of white hair, which is _also_ weird, but to top it all off, there’s something twitching there. Squinting in the dim lighting provided by his desk lamp, he realizes what it is, abruptly. Ears. The dude has white hair and white _ears_ , like some kinda...bat or cat or something. 

Weakly, Lance manages, “Oh, ears.” 

A moment later, he makes the connection between the name and who he’s seeing, even if the hair color is _wrong_ and the guy that he’s looking at didn’t have fluffy ears beforehand. 

“Holy shit, _Keith_ ,” Lance breathes, staring him down. Keith, _that_ Keith, the one who’d always been around Matt and Shiro, sure, but also the one who’d _failed out_ which is how Lance had ended up where he was. That Keith.

Lance’d always thought of him as a rival if only because it helped him push himself if he had something to measure himself against, and Keith was undeniably, infuriatingly _better than him_ be it by a second, or a point. What was worse is he didn’t even seem to need to try; Lance never saw him at study sessions and never saw him at any of the tutoring ones either, so either he was stupid good and didn’t need help or someone (probably Shiro) was tutoring him privately. He wasn’t sure which was more of a mix of disappointing and frustrating, but they were both enough that Lance _pushed_ himself to be better. That was the Keith standing in front of him. That Keith had white hair, fluffy ears, a space suit on, and when he opened his mouth, Lance saw _fangs._

“Oh my god, Terry was right, you are an alien,” Lance says with dawning realization. Terry was the guy who’d started the rumor about the new kid being an alien; it’d been mostly a joke and it’d been shut down (probably by Shiro, now that he’s thinking about it). Did Shiro know? Was Shiro tutoring an alien in physics and astronomy? Did an alien _actually need to be tutored in that_? That seemed ridiculous.

From behind Keith, there’s a rusty, ragged noise that Lance belatedly places as a choked out laugh. The bed springs squeal as Shiro hefts himself up and wobbles which is enough for Keith to sheathe the knife in a rush and head over to him, planting a hand (it has claws. His hand has _claws_ ) on Shiro’s chest like it’s nothing. Shiro doesn’t freak out, which, points to him because in his situation Lance is relatively certain that he’d be freaking out if he had an alien guy with a clawed hand on his chest. Then again, if he had as much muscle and weight as Shiro did and a crazy metal arm, maybe he wouldn’t need to be scared. 

“It’s not funny.” Lance catches the words as he edges closer, Keith muttering them under his breath. Now that it’s evident that he’s not getting stabbed, he feels a little more confident in trying to come closer and figure out what the hell apparently-an-alien-Keith is doing in his room right now. 

“It’s...a little funny,” Shiro points out, and boy, he sounds _beat_. Lance is close enough to see even with the dim lighting of the single desk lamp that there are blue smudges under his eyes from exhaustion; apparently sleeping for a full twenty-four hours wasn’t enough to get rid of it. Apparently, he’s already gone through Hunk’s closet because he’s wearing one of Hunk’s old pajama shirts. 

They haven’t done laundry in a week (they were supposed to, up until they broke into the facility and stole Shiro) which means the only shirt left is the one that Shiro is wearing and Lance _chokes_ when he flicks the light on and realizes what it says. He’d gotten it as a gag gift for Hunk for Christmas, knowing he’d probably never wear it, but written across the chest in bold font is: REAL MEN RUB THEIR MEAT with a picture of a variety of different kinds of seasonings on it. It was exactly the kind of mortifying gift that Lance excelled at giving, but Hunk, always the best friend ever, had kept it. 

A moment later, Keith seems to notice the same thing because he glances down. Stares a moment. Then levels a look at Lance that’s so harsh it could make paint flake off of walls. “It was for _Hunk,_ ” Lance hisses in defense which prompts _Shiro_ to look down and then stare at the ceiling, clearly needing a moment. This is, of course, even more problematic, because of course it is. 

See, a year ago, a series of posters had come out for the Garrison. They were shitty quality, but added extra income (apparently used on setting up a secret facility to keep Shiro in) was good for the Garrison and good for promotional purposes. Hunk had gotten him one for his birthday and Lance had put it on their ceiling. On it, Shiro was centered with his arms crossed, hat tilted just so, hair trimmed to regs. The Garrison uniform looked like shit on most people, but somehow, Shiro had pulled it off and looked _good_. Distantly, Lance is aware that death would be kinder than his hero finding out that he has a poster of him centered on the ceiling of his dormroom. 

“Oh.” Shiro says, seeming to take in the image and realize what it means. A moment later, he glances over at Lance, who stares back at him, daring him to say something. He seems to think better of it, thankfully, and rubs the back of his neck. “It’s just a shirt, Keith.” 

“That doesn’t make it better,” Keith retorts. Thankfully, Keith doesn’t look up, and Lance isn’t going to have to jump off a cliff, which is literally the only good thing Lance has going for him today.

“It was for a _joke_ and laundry day got a little delayed because we had to rescue him from the Garrison,” Lance hisses back, so very, very deeply not in the mood to argue what the right path of action was with a guy who wasn’t there helping rescue Shiro in the first place. “It’s not like you were around to help _rescue_ him.” 

“ _That doesn’t make it better_ , either!” Keith hisses back, shoulders tightening like he’s gearing up for a fight, which, sure, bring it, Lance wants to get him back for the whole shoving his face against his door thing, anyway. “And how did you _rescue_ him! You took him from the Garrison, and we’re back! At the Garrison! That’s not rescuing!”

“I don’t c-” Lance starts, only for Shiro to step in between the two of them, placing one hand on Lance’s shoulder to stop him, while the other hand -- the shiny, metal robot hand, almost lands on Keith’s shoulder and then he seems to think better of it. Keith notices, if his narrow-eyed look is anything to judge, but doesn’t comment. If anything, Lance would categorize the reaction as _hurt_.

“Guys. Calm down. Lance, I don’t know how you knew to do it or how you managed, but thank you for rescuing me. I don’t know how long I’ve been out, but we can’t argue right now, we need to get out of here and find Voltron before the Galra get here.” Shiro pauses a second and his face goes funny before glancing at Keith and then amending his statement. “Before the bad Galra get here.” 

“Okay,” Lance draws the word out long and slow, glancing between the two of them dubiously. “Who, exactly, are the Galra, what is Voltron, and most importantly, how did _you_ break in here?” The last bit is demanded of Keith, Lance leveling a finger at him. It was hard enough to sneak Shiro in here, but somehow Keith-- recently flunked out, now white haired and with big ears, so _pretty obvious_ \-- somehow he’d managed to get himself in with seemingly no effort. If it wasn’t one thing he was better at it was another. Maybe Lance could blame it on weird alien luck, since _that was an excuse_ now, apparently.

“Cloaking technology,” Keith mutters after a beat, ducking away from Shiro’s hand and throwing himself down into the chair with a sigh. Lance finds a lot of this situation irritating, but Keith throwing himself into _Lance’s chair_ like he owns it is somehow the most irritating thing at this moment. “We _really_ don’t have time to explain everything to you. However you got him in, we need to get him and me _out_. Sooner rather than later or we’re going to miss the rendezvous by two doboshes.” 

“Okay, A, that’s not a real word, and B, I didn’t get him all the way in here myself, are you kidding me? He’s huge and that arm is heavy, and I’ve got _pretty good muscles_ but I’m not a miracle worker here.” A pause, and then Lance figures he’s petty enough to continue with, “Or an alien. I’m not one of those, either.” 

_Unlike some people_ goes unsaid. 

Before Keith can retort, though, the door opens and all of them freeze. _We’re so screwed_ , Lance thinks, but a moment later Hunk ushers Pidge into the room and then follows, leaving their tiny dorm way too full of people. For a second, everyone stops and then the room erupts into chaos. It’s hushed, muted yelling, but chaos nonetheless until Shiro blows out a harsh breath and raises his voice, just a touch; evidently, he still has that commanding tone down pat because the room stops. 

“Okay, enough.” Just like that, everyone pauses and four sets of eyes swing to him. “I think we all want the same thing right now, which is to get out of here.” 

Keith looks fiercely satisfied, but Hunk lifts a hand slowly, raising a finger. 

“Um. I mean, yes. I would absolutely like it if people who were illegally snuck into my dorm room were not here. But I _really_ want to know why Keith has white hair and ears, too. So.” The finger lowers, and then Hunk casts Lance a sideways look, like he somehow can answer the question. “...Was Terry right?” 

Keith is absolutely going to stab one of them. 

Before anyone can say anything or any knives can be put into people, Shiro answers. “First priority is getting out of here.” 

“...I mean, I kind of want to know how you got in too, since that might be the key to getting _out_ of here more easily,” Pidge says, frowning. “Also, Lance, didn’t you say you set up traps to keep people from getting in? And a letter.” 

“I _did_ ,” Lance confirms and looks accusingly at Keith, who doesn’t look repentant in the slightest, the asshole. 

“He didn’t make it so no one could get _in_. You-” Oh, now he’s pointing at Lance, that’s fun. “-booby-trapped your dorm! Who booby-traps their _dorm_?” 

Ever the loyal buddy, Hunk interjects, “Uhh, people who have snuck a guy into their dorm room and are trying to hide him. Those kind of people.”

Lance doesn’t say anything but Hunk gets the head tip which is good enough. 

“That’s not the point. What if Shiro’d gotten hurt,” Keith’s ears are flat against his skull like an angry cat’s and it’s extremely distracting. “How would the letter _not suffice_?” 

“Uh, you didn’t seem him freaking out when he woke up and you _also_ didn’t see the Garrison guys who tranqued him when he woke up so they could study him.” He’s made some dumb decisions in the past but all in all this was the best possible decision in a ridiculous situation and Shiro was okay, so Keith doesn’t really have a leg to stand on with criticizing him here. “Also, Shiro didn’t get hurt, okay, he would have had to go through like five signs to trip and also, I didn’t know you were gonna _break into my room._ ” 

Shiro cuts him off again before he can point out that if he’d known that Keith was going to break into his room, he would have doubled the booby traps. Probably for the best. “Cloaking technology. It can cover all of us; Keith has scans of the faculty, but we’ll still need a way to fake having the keycards to get out.” 

For some reason, he knows to look to Pidge for this, but Pidge is already pushing Keith out of the way with one foot on the rolling chair and setting up his computer, tapping away. “If he does have some kind of cloaking tech that can hide us, I can get us through the gates.” 

“If you get us past the gates, I’ve got a bike stashed that can get us out of here. Ulaz will be at the drop point and we _need_ to be there. I’ve already made contact with him and Leader,” Keith says and sounds extremely certain about all of that, whereas Lance wonders who the hell Ulaz and Leader are, and why almost every twenty words Keith says sound like they’re _made up_. “Shiro, please. We have to get you somewhere safe and I have to find Blue.” 

From the way that Shiro deflates, Lance knows Keith’s won this round. They still have classes they need to go to but Lance has the feeling that they’re going to end up missing today’s at the very least. 

“The rest of you should get to class, you don’t need to get caught up in this,” Shiro murmurs kindly, but wildly unsuccessfully since both Lance and Pidge stare back at him and Hunk raises both of his hands to his face. “...Or not.” 

“Yeah, or not. Sorry, you’re stuck with us until we find out what’s going on,” Lance points out, and then stares at Keith. “Okay, so. Cloaking. How does this work?” 

“No, no we can count me out, I am one hundred percent sure that I don’t need or want to be caught up in this,” Hunk tries, which works about exactly as well as Lance figures it will.

That is, it doesn’t work at all.

**Author's Note:**

> EXTRA:
> 
> “It’s us,” Keith says over everyone talking at once, and the big, tall, dude (wearing the same armor as Keith but like three times as big as Shiro and with a _tail_ ) lifts his hand to his mask and it fades away. “I brought him.” 
> 
> “And extras.” Keith also brought three other people who are all staring at The New Guy like he’s an alien (which he is, so it’s entirely merited) so Lance is pretty sure that New Guy isn’t thrilled. Oh well. 
> 
> With the cloaking fading, Lance looks over to see Hunk and not Professor Atkins. Hunk smiles thinly and then looks at Shiro and inhales through his nose, exhales heavily through his mouth. “We have _got_ to get you a new shirt.” 
> 
> “It was a good gift,” Lance mutters, to which Hunk pats his shoulder. 
> 
> ___
> 
> follow me on the twitters over [here](https://twitter.com/SarahKFetter) for quality content such as pictures of how stupid my cat's face is. Talk to me about Shance! Tell me what kind of stuff you'd want to see! I'm mostly just bsing ridiculous stuff I want to write but \o/


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